"Remember Me": Forget About It

Details

Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Saturday, 13 March 2010 15:08

Written by Maitland McDonagh / Miss FlickChick

Directed by Allen Coulter
Written by Paul Fetters
Starring  Robert Pattinson, Pierce Brosnan, Emilie de Ravin, Chris Cooper, Lena Olin, Tate Ellington, Martha Plimpton

Veteran TV director Allen Coulter and first time screen writer Paul Fetters head down the road of good intentions, but it's viewers who wind up in a hell of overwrought melodrama with a monumental twist.

New York, 1991: On a deserted subway platform, 11-year-old Ally Craig (Caitlyn Paige Rund) watches in terror as her mother (Martha Plimpton) is first harassed and then murdered by a gang of thugs.

New York, 2001: Rumpled, moody NYU student Tyler Hawkins (Twilight's Robert Pattinson) joins his family — father Charles (Pierce Brosnan), a sleek, hot-shot lawyer; bohemian mom Diane (Lena Olin) and her easy-going current husband (Jbara); and precocious baby sister Caroline (Ruby Jerins) — for their annual visit to the grave of his older brother. Despite Diane's efforts to keep the peace, Charles manages to belittle Caroline, already a talented artist at age 11, and piss off the already disgruntled Tyler.

That night, Tyler and his aggressively annoying roommate, Aidan (Tate Ellington), go out drinking and wind up in jail after Tyler mouths off to hard ass Sergeant Neil Craig (Chris Cooper), who goes out of his way to humiliate Tyler. Soon after, Aidan discovers that Craig's daughter, Ally (Emilie de Ravin), just happens to be a fellow NYU student and comes up with the perfect revenge: Tyler should seduce Ally and then cruelly break her heart. But the beautiful, haunted souls instead fall in love.

A bumper crop of secondary angst is woven into the story of Tyler and Ally's tempestuous relationship: Eccentric Caroline is bullied by middle-school mean girls. Ally fights with her (understandably) overprotective father. Tyler has a series of increasingly fractious run-ins with his dad, whom he blames for his brother's suicide. Diane tries to heal the emotional wounds that have sundered her loved ones.

And so it goes for most of the movie's 113-minute running time: Soul-searching, emotional anguish and dramatic confrontations punctuated by little stabs at happiness. And then along comes the great big twist — read no further if you don't want to know what it is.

It's not just 2001: It's September 11, 2001, and someone just happens to be at the World Trade Center bright and early on that fateful Tuesday morning. The sight of a plane plowing into the towers is clearly meant to drive home the message that every moment is precious and every day should be lived as though it were the last. But it has exactly the opposite effect, throwing into high relief the fundamental triviality of family feuds, lovers' spats and schoolyard squabbles, and making everyone look spoiled and self-indulgent.

For more by Maitland McDonagh: MissFlickChick.com

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